New Year. Yup. First FR o’ the year. What do we have for you?

How about – first up – there’re these couple of stories by Gabe Durham over at Corium – IN CASE OF EMERGENCY and POWERS. They’re from 2012, okay, but: DAMN. Great stuff.

Check out Mira Mattar’s LION AND GAZELLE at Treehouse.

Can’t recommend this enough: In The Rumpus’ ALBUMS OF OUR LIVES series, Issue One contributor Ryan Werner writes on NEKO CASE’S MIDDLE CYCLONE. “I won’t claim to understand the anomalies exclusive to females, and though Middle Cyclonehasn’t fixed very many of my personality flaws, it’s opened up a gateway of empathy. I respect fear. Mine, yours, his, hers. I am as feral as anything that breathes.”

Also at The Rumpus: there’s a whole series of takes on Django Unchained. This one is pretty challenging: DJANGO TAKE #3: (RE)CHAINED by Nicholas Rombes.

A new issue of Banango Street Lit is up this week. There’s this story, I AM YOUR ANCESTOR, by Ben Tanzer. Also, Wendy Xu has two poems up in the issue. Here’s DEAR FUTURE WHERE EVERYTHING IS HYPOTHETICAL EXCEPT JOY. And, because we’re big Salvatore Pane fans over here – and, how can you not read NBA fiction? – here is LATRELL SPREWELL from the Banango.

That’s a good start to your Friday morning, yeah? First Friday Rex of the New Year, signing off.